Pictures taken by Panasonic GS19, and processed with Pinnacle Studio software
Northern Parula female
Late Thursday afternoon, May 11, 2006 I saw a very small bird under the bushes at Fine Arts. I pulled out my camera and captured a few seconds of video. Through the viewfinder I thought it looked like a Mockingbird shrunk down to a tiny size. I thought it might be a Kinglet. My viewfinder is black and white and I didn't get to see the colors until I processed the video. Then I saw the color on its back and front, and was amazed. It took a while to research what it is but the Northern Parula (a tiny Warbler) is what I found. This is a female.
Frames clipped from video Panasonic GS-19 (May 11,
2006) - at Fine Arts. Mouse click on pictures to see videos
Northern Parula male
Frames clipped from video Panasonic GS-19 Fine Arts
area (5/24/2006). Mouse click on pictures to see videos.
Around 12:30 May 24, 2006 I saw this
bird near the Fine Arts building. I thought this was a Black-throated Blue
Warbler but the coloration on it's chest suggests something different. The dark
spot on its chest descends further down then the Black-throat's. It does not
have the long black strip down its side like the Black-throat - easily seen in
the pictures above. And finally the yellow swatch under the dark spot suggests
something else. I thought maybe the Mourning Warbler. But there is a problem
with that identification - the bird would not have wing-bars (the white strips
on the wing) and the yellow underneath would stretch further down where on this
bird the the yellow stops and we see white. The wing bars are also different
from those of the Black-throated Warbler where this bird's front bar is bigger
then the rear one while it's the opposite for the Black-throated Blue Warbler.
Another alternative might be the Bay-breasted Warbler. It has the correct
wing-bars. The chest and side coloration look correct. The black head is
correct but resource material shows a light patch on the neck behind the eye. I
can't see the patch here or my angle is bad (which happens a lot). I have gone
back and forth trying to name this bird and I think I finally have it - it's a
Northern Parula male. The yellow patch on the front separates it from the
most of the others. Another point is the wing-bars. The one closest
to the head is wider than the second one and if you look at the female at the
top of the page tour see the similarity. The Northern Parula male would
have some yellow just below the beak. In the left hand shot you can see a
hint of yellow. All of my shots are from the side angle which limits
seeing some of the color on this bird.
Same video in different format.
Click here to see MS Photo Story presentation of this bird.
On May 16, 2006 while capturing some video of the Black-throated Blue Warbler I
caught two seconds of another bird higher in the trees. The video is not good
and I misidentified it at first as a Black-throat, and then as the Bay-breasted
Warbler but now I believe the second bird in the trees that day was a Northern
Parula male. In the blurry frame seen here the bird is turning around (to its
left and towards the camera) and the reddish coloration on its chest is
captured. The bird's tail is center frame pointing to the right. In the
original video of the Black-throated Warbler, at the very beginning the bird you
hear is the Northern Parula and not the Black-throat who you hear continually
through the remainder of the video. It was an active day for Warblers on
the Quad that day.
Mouse click on the image to see the two second clip.
Mouse click here to see the MS Photo Story presentation where the frames are
broken out.
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Ed McHugh, OIT Camden Computing Service.
Copyright © 2004 [OIT Camden]. All rights reserved.
Revised:
Tuesday, April 01, 2008
